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Turkey
| image_flag = Flag of Turkey.svg.png | national_motto = | national_anthem = | }} | image_map = Turkey (orthographic projection).svg.png | capital = Ankara | coordinates = | largest_city = Istanbul }} | official_languages = Turkish | languages_type = Spoken languagesEthnologue: [https://www.ethnologue.com/country/tr/languages Ethnologue Languages of the World – Turkey], Retrieved 15 October 2017. | languages = | ethnic_groups = | demonym = | government_type = Unitary presidential constitutional republic | leader_title1 = President | leader_name1 = Recep Tayyip Erdoğan | leader_title2 = Vice-President | leader_name2 = Fuat Oktay | leader_title3 = Assembly Speaker | leader_name3 = Mustafa Şentop | legislature = | established_event1 = War of Independence | established_date1 = 19 May 1919 | established_event2 = Grand National Assembly of Turkey | established_date2 = 23 April 1920 | established_event3 = | established_date3 = 24 July 1923 | established_event4 = | established_date4 = 29 October 1923 | area_km2 = 783,356 | area_rank = 36th | area_sq_mi = 302535 | percent_water = 1.3 | population_estimate = 82,003,882 (19th) | population_estimate_year = 2018 | population_density_km2 = 105 | population_density_sq_mi = 262 | population_density_rank = 107th | GDP_PPP = $2.347 trillion | GDP_PPP_year = 2019 | GDP_PPP_rank = 13th | GDP_PPP_per_capita = $28,264 | GDP_PPP_per_capita_rank = 45th | GDP_nominal = $743.708 billion | GDP_nominal_year = 2019 | GDP_nominal_rank = 19th | GDP_nominal_per_capita = $8,958 | GDP_nominal_per_capita_rank = 60th | Gini = 41.9 | Gini_year = 2016 | Gini_change = decrease | Gini_ref = | Gini_rank = 56th | HDI = 0.791 | HDI_year = 2017 | HDI_change = increase | HDI_ref = | HDI_rank = 64th | currency = Turkish lira (₺) | currency_code = TRY | time_zone = FET | utc_offset = +3 | date_format = dd/mm/yyyy (AD) | drives_on = right | calling_code = +90 | cctld = .tr | official_website = | today = | religion = }} Turkey ( ), officially the Republic of Turkey ( ), is a transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolian peninsula in Western Asia, with a small portion on the Balkan peninsula in Southeast Europe. East Thrace, the part of Turkey in Europe, is separated from Anatolia by the Sea of Marmara, the Bosphorous and the Dardanelles (collectively called the Turkish Straits). "Europe" (pp. 68–69); "Asia" (pp. 90–91): "A commonly accepted division between Asia and Europe ... is formed by the Ural Mountains, Ural River, Caspian Sea, Caucasus Mountains, and the Black Sea with its outlets, the Bosporus and Dardanelles." Turkey is bordered by Greece and Bulgaria to its northwest; Georgia to its northeast; Armenia, the Azerbaijani exclave of Nakhchivan and Iran to the east; and Iraq and Syria to the south. Istanbul is the largest city while Ankara is the capital. Approximately 70 to 80 per cent of the country's citizens identify as Turkish. Kurds are the largest minority at anywhere from 15 to 20 percent of the population. At various points in its history, the region has been inhabited by diverse civilisations including the Assyrians, Greeks, Thracians, Phrygians, Urartians, and Armenians. |title=The Oxford Handbook of Ancient Anatolia: (10,000–323 BC)|author1=Sharon R. Steadman|author2=Gregory McMahon|year=2011|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-537614-2|pages=3–11, 37|access-date=23 March 2013}} Hellenization started during the era of Alexander the Great and continued into the Byzantine era. |title=Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible|author1=David Noel Freedman|author2=Allen C. Myers|author3=Astrid Biles Beck|publisher=Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing|year=2000|isbn=978-0-8028-2400-4|page=61|access-date=24 March 2013}} The Seljuk Turks began migrating into the area in the 11th century, and their victory over the Byzantines at the Battle of Manzikert in 1071 symbolises the start and foundation of Turkey. The Seljuk Sultanate of Rûm ruled Anatolia until the Mongol invasion in 1243, when it disintegrated into small Turkmen principalities. Beginning in the late 13th century, the Ottomans started uniting these Turkish principalities. After Mehmed II conquered Constantinople in 1453, Ottoman expansion continued under Selim I. During the reign of Suleiman the Magnificent the Ottoman Empire encompassed much of Southeast Europe, West Asia and North Africa and became a world power. In the following centuries the state entered a period of decline with a gradual loss of territories and wars. In an effort to consolidate the weakening social and political foundations of the empire, Mahmut II started a period of modernisation in the early 19th century, bringing reforms in all areas of the state including the military and bureaucracy along with the emancipation of all citizens.Roderic. H. Davison, Essays in Ottoman and Turkish History, 1774-1923 – The Impact of West, Texas 1990, pp. 115-116. In 1913, a coup d'état effectively put the country under the control of the Three Pashas. During World War I, the Ottoman government committed genocides against its Armenian, Assyrian and Pontic Greek subjects. Scholars give several reasons for Turkey's position including the preservation of national identity, the demand for reparations and territorial concerns. }} Following the war, the conglomeration of territories and peoples that formerly comprised the Ottoman Empire was partitioned into several new states.Roderic H. Davison; Review "From Paris to Sèvres: The Partition of the Ottoman Empire at the Peace Conference of 1919–1920" by Paul C. Helmreich in Slavic Review, Vol. 34, No. 1 (March 1975), pp. 186–187 The Turkish War of Independence, initiated by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk and his colleagues against occupying Allied Powers, resulted in the abolition of monarchy in 1922 and the establishment of the Republic of Turkey in 1923, with Atatürk as its first president. Atatürk enacted numerous reforms, many of which incorporated various aspects of Western thought, philosophy, and customs into the new form of Turkish government.S.N. Eisenstadt, "The Kemalist Regime and Modernization: Some Comparative and Analytical Remarks," in J. Landau, ed., Atatürk and the Modernisation of Turkey, Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 1984, 3–16. The Kurdish–Turkish conflict, an armed conflict between the Republic of Turkey and Kurdish insurgents, has been active since 1984 primarily in the southeast of the country. Various Kurdish groups demand separation from Turkey to create an independent Kurdistan or to have autonomy and greater political and cultural rights for Kurds in Turkey. Turkey is a charter member of the UN, an early member of NATO, the IMF and the World Bank, and a founding member of the OECD, OSCE, BSEC, OIC and G-20. After becoming one of the first members of the Council of Europe in 1949, Turkey became an associate member of the EEC in 1963, joined the EU Customs Union in 1995 and started accession negotiations with the European Union in 2005 which have been effectively stopped by the EU in 2018 with the EU's General Affairs Council stating that "the Council notes that Turkey has been moving further away from the European Union. Turkey’s accession negotiations have therefore effectively come to a standstill and no further chapters can be considered for opening or closing and no further work towards the modernisation of the EU-Turkey Customs Union is foreseen." Turkey's economy and diplomatic initiatives led to its recognition as a regional power while its location has given it geopolitical and strategic importance throughout history. Turkey is a secular, unitary, formerly parliamentary republic which adopted a presidential system with a referendum in 2017; the new system came into effect with the presidential election in 2018. It is currently ranked 110 out of 167 countries in the Democracy Index. Turkey's current administration headed by president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan of the AKP has enacted measures to increase the influence of Islam, and undermine Kemalist policies and freedom of the press. > Etymology The English name of Turkey (from Medieval Latin Turchia/''Turquia'' ) means "land of the Turks". Middle English usage of Turkye is evidenced in an early work by Chaucer called The Book of the Duchess (c. 1369). The phrase land of Torke is used in the 15th-century Digby Mysteries. Later usages can be found in the Dunbar poems, the 16th century Manipulus Vocabulorum ("Turkie, Tartaria") and Francis Bacon's Sylva Sylvarum (Turky). The modern spelling "Turkey" dates back to at least 1719. The Turkish name Türkiye was adopted in 1923 under the influence of European usage. History Prehistory of Anatolia and Eastern Thrace s at Göbekli Tepe were erected as far back as 9600 BC, predating those of Stonehenge, England, by over seven millennia.]] , capital of the Hittite Empire. The city's history dates back to the 6th millennium BC. ]] The Anatolian peninsula, comprising most of modern Turkey, is one of the oldest permanently settled regions in the world. Various ancient Anatolian populations have lived in Anatolia, from at least the Neolithic period until the Hellenistic period. Many of these peoples spoke the Anatolian languages, a branch of the larger Indo-European language family. In fact, given the antiquity of the Indo-European Hittite and Luwian languages, some scholars have proposed Anatolia as the hypothetical centre from which the Indo-European languages radiated. The European part of Turkey, called Eastern Thrace, has also been inhabited since at least forty thousand years ago, and is known to have been in the Neolithic era by about 6000 BC. Göbekli Tepe is the site of the oldest known man-made religious structure, a temple dating to circa 10,000 BC, while Çatalhöyük is a very large Neolithic and Chalcolithic settlement in southern Anatolia, which existed from approximately 7500 BC to 5700 BC. It is the largest and best-preserved Neolithic site found to date and in July 2012 was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The settlement of Troy started in the Neolithic Age and continued into the Iron Age. The earliest recorded inhabitants of Anatolia were the Hattians and Hurrians, non-Indo-European peoples who inhabited central and eastern Anatolia, respectively, as early as c. 2300 BC. Indo-European Hittites came to Anatolia and gradually absorbed the Hattians and Hurrians c. 2000–1700 BC. The first major empire in the area was founded by the Hittites, from the 18th through the 13th century BC. The Assyrians conquered and settled parts of southeastern Turkey as early as 1950 BC until the year 612 BC, although they have remained a minority in the region, namely in Hakkari, Sirnak and Mardin. Urartu re-emerged in Assyrian inscriptions in the 9th century BC as a powerful northern rival of Assyria. Following the collapse of the Hittite empire c. 1180 BC, the Phrygians, an Indo-European people, achieved ascendancy in Anatolia until their kingdom was destroyed by the Cimmerians in the 7th century BC. Starting from 714 BC, Urartu shared the same fate and dissolved in 590 BC, when it was conquered by the Medes. The most powerful of Phrygia's successor states were Lydia, Caria and Lycia. Antiquity (modern Bodrum) was built in the 4th century BC by Mausolus, the Persian satrap (governor) of Caria. The Mausoleum at Halicarnassus (Tomb of Mausolus) was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. ]] in Ephesus was built by the Romans in 114–117. The Temple of Artemis in Ephesus, built by king Croesus of Lydia in the 6th century BC, was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. ]] Starting around 1200 BC, the coast of Anatolia was heavily settled by Aeolian and Ionian Greeks. Numerous important cities were founded by these colonists, such as Miletus, Ephesus, Smyrna (now İzmir) and Byzantium (now Istanbul), the latter founded by Greek colonists from Megara in 657 BC. The first state that was called Armenia by neighbouring peoples was the state of the Armenian Orontid dynasty, which included parts of eastern Turkey beginning in the 6th century BC. In Northwest Turkey, the most significant tribal group in Thrace was the Odyrisians, founded by Teres I. |access-date=7 April 2013|year=1994|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-0-521-23348-4|page=444}} All of modern-day Turkey was conquered by the Persian Achaemenid Empire during the 6th century BC.Joseph Roisman, Ian Worthington. "A companion to Ancient Macedonia" John Wiley & Sons, 2011. pp. 135–138, 343 The Greco-Persian Wars started when the Greek city states on the coast of Anatolia rebelled against Persian rule in 499 BC. The territory of Turkey later fell to Alexander the Great in 334 BC, which led to increasing cultural homogeneity and Hellenization in the area. Following Alexander's death in 323 BC, Anatolia was subsequently divided into a number of small Hellenistic kingdoms, all of which became part of the Roman Republic by the mid-1st century BC. The process of Hellenization that began with Alexander's conquest accelerated under Roman rule, and by the early centuries of the Christian Era, the local Anatolian languages and cultures had become extinct, being largely replaced by ancient Greek language and culture. |access-date=24 March 2013|year= 2011|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-1-139-50178-1|page=1}} From the 1st century BC up to the 3rd century CE, large parts of modern-day Turkey were contested between the Romans and neighbouring Parthians through the frequent Roman-Parthian Wars. Early Christian and Byzantine period in Istanbul was built by the Byzantine emperor Justinian I in 532–537 AD. ]] According to Acts of Apostles 11, Antioch (now Antakya), a city in southern Turkey, is the birthplace of the first Christian community.Encyclopaedia Biblica, Vol. I, p. 186 (p. 125 of 612 in online .pdf file). In 324, Constantine I chose Byzantium to be the new capital of the Roman Empire, renaming it New Rome. Following the death of Theodosius I in 395 and the permanent division of the Roman Empire between his two sons, the city, which would popularly come to be known as Constantinople, became the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire. This empire, which would later be branded by historians as the Byzantine Empire, ruled most of the territory of present-day Turkey until the Late Middle Ages; although the eastern regions remained in firm Sasanian hands up to the first half of the seventh century. The frequent Byzantine-Sassanid Wars, as part of the centuries long-lasting Roman-Persian Wars, fought between the neighbouring rivalling Byzantines and Sasanians, took place in various parts of present-day Turkey and decided much of the latter's history from the fourth century up to the first half of the seventh century. Several ecumenical councils of the early Church were held in cities located in present-day Turkey including the First Council of Nicaea (Iznik) in 325, the First Council of Constantinople (Istanbul) in 381, the Council of Ephesus in 431, and the Council of Chalcedon (Kadıköy) in 451. Seljuks and the Ottoman Empire of Istanbul has four minarets that span 107.1 metres, a measurement that refers to the Battle of Manzikert (1071). ]] The House of Seljuk was a branch of the Kınık Oğuz Turks who resided on the periphery of the Muslim world, in the Yabgu Khaganate of the Oğuz confederacy, to the north of the Caspian and Aral Seas, in the 9th century. In the 10th century, the Seljuks started migrating from their ancestral homeland into Persia, which became the administrative core of the Great Seljuk Empire, after its foundation by Tughril. In the latter half of the 11th century, the Seljuk Turks began penetrating into medieval Armenia and the eastern regions of Anatolia. In 1071, the Seljuks defeated the Byzantines at the Battle of Manzikert, starting the Turkification process in the area; the Turkish language and Islam were introduced to Armenia and Anatolia, gradually spreading throughout the region. The slow transition from a predominantly Christian and Greek-speaking Anatolia to a predominantly Muslim and Turkish-speaking one was underway. The Mevlevi Order of dervishes, which was established in Konya during the 13th century by Sufi poet Celaleddin Rumi, played a significant role in the Islamization of the diverse people of Anatolia who had previously been Hellenized. Thus, alongside the Turkification of the territory, the culturally Persianized Seljuks set the basis for a Turko-Persian principal culture in Anatolia,Craig S. Davis. "The Middle East For Dummies" p. 66 which their eventual successors, the Ottomans, would take over.Thomas Spencer Baynes. "The Encyclopædia Britannica: Latest Edition. A Dictionary of Arts, Sciences and General Literature, Volume 23". Werner, 1902Emine Fetvacı. "Picturing History at the Ottoman Court" p 18 In 1243, the Seljuk armies were defeated by the Mongols at the Battle of Köse Dağ, causing the Seljuk Empire's power to slowly disintegrate. In its wake, one of the Turkish principalities governed by Osman I would evolve over the next 200 years into the Ottoman Empire. In 1453, the Ottomans completed their conquest of the Byzantine Empire by capturing its capital, Constantinople. In 1514, Sultan Selim I (1512–1520) successfully expanded the empire's southern and eastern borders by defeating Shah Ismail I of the Safavid dynasty in the Battle of Chaldiran. In 1517, Selim I expanded Ottoman rule into Algeria and Egypt, and created a naval presence in the Red Sea. Subsequently, a contest started between the Ottoman and Portuguese empires to become the dominant sea power in the Indian Ocean, with a number of naval battles in the Red Sea, the Arabian Sea and the Persian Gulf. The Portuguese presence in the Indian Ocean was perceived as a threat to the Ottoman monopoly over the ancient trade routes between East Asia and Western Europe. Despite the increasingly prominent European presence, the Ottoman Empire's trade with the east continued to flourish until the second half of the 18th century. The Ottoman Empire's power and prestige peaked in the 16th and 17th centuries, particularly during the reign of Suleiman the Magnificent, who personally instituted major legislative changes relating to society, education, taxation and criminal law. The empire was often at odds with the Holy Roman Empire in its steady advance towards Central Europe through the Balkans and the southern part of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. |access-date=15 June 2013|volume=1|year=1976|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-0-521-29163-7|page=213}} At sea, the Ottoman Navy contended with several Holy Leagues, such as those in 1538, 1571, 1684 and 1717 (composed primarily of Habsburg Spain, the Republic of Genoa, the Republic of Venice, the Knights of St. John, the Papal States, the Grand Duchy of Tuscany and the Duchy of Savoy), for the control of the Mediterranean Sea. In the east, the Ottomans were often at war with Safavid Persia over conflicts stemming from territorial disputes or religious differences between the 16th and 18th centuries. The Ottoman wars with Persia continued as the Zand, Afsharid, and Qajar dynasties succeeded the Safavids in Iran, until the first half of the 19th century. Even further east, there was an extension of the Habsburg-Ottoman conflict, in that the Ottomans also had to send soldiers to their farthest and easternmost vassal and territory, the Sultanate of AcehPalabiyik, Hamit, Turkish Public Administration: From Tradition to the Modern Age, (Ankara, 2008), 84. in Southeast Asia, to defend it from European colonizers as well as the Latino invaders that had crossed from Latin-America and had Christianized formerly Muslim-dominated Philippines.Charles A. Truxillo (2012), Jain Publishing Company, "Crusaders in the Far East: The Moro Wars in the Philippines in the Context of the Ibero-Islamic World War". From the 16th to the early 20th centuries, the Ottoman Empire also fought twelve wars with the Russian Tsardom and Empire. These were initially about Ottoman territorial expansion and consolidation in southeastern and eastern Europe; but starting from the latter half of the 18th century, they became more about the survival of the Ottoman Empire, which had begun to lose its strategic territories on the northern Black Sea coast to the advancing Russians. and Kaiser Wilhelm II in Constantinople, 1917. The Ottomans joined World War I on the side of the Central Powers. ]] From the second half of the 18th century onwards, the Ottoman Empire began to decline. The Tanzimat reforms of the 19th century, which had been instituted by Mahmud II, were aimed to modernise the Ottoman state in line with the progress that had been made in Western Europe. The efforts of Midhat Pasha during the late Tanzimat era led the Ottoman constitutional movement of 1876, which introduced the First Constitutional Era, but these efforts proved to be inadequate in most fields, and failed to stop the dissolution of the empire. |access-date=18 February 2015}} As the empire gradually shrank in size, military power and wealth, especially after the Ottoman economic crisis and default in 1875 which led to uprisings in the Balkan provinces that culminated into the Russo-Turkish War of 1877–78, many Balkan Muslims migrated to the Empire's heartland in Anatolia, |access-date=15 June 2013|year=2009|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-972838-1|page=175}} |access-date=28 February 2013|year=2005|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-0-521-53854-1|page=118}} along with the Circassians fleeing the Russian conquest of the Caucasus. The decline of the Ottoman Empire led to a rise in nationalist sentiment among its various subject peoples, leading to increased ethnic tensions which occasionally burst into violence, such as the Hamidian massacres of Armenians. During the "First Constitutional Era", the constitution and parliament had been suspended by Sultan Abdul Hamid II. Thirty years later, the Young Turk Revolution of 1908 restored the Ottoman constitution and parliament, but the 1913 Ottoman coup d'état effectively put the country under the control of the Three Pashas, making sultans Mehmed V and Mehmed VI largely symbolic figureheads with no real political power. " (During the Armenian Genocide by the Turkish state)US Library of Congress, George Grantham Bain Collection Photo ID LC-USZ62-48100 "Syria – Aleppo – Armenian woman kneeling beside dead child in field "within sight of help and safety at Aleppo"]] The Ottoman Empire entered World War I on the side of the Central Powers and was ultimately defeated. During the war, the empire's Armenians were deported to Syria as part of the Armenian Genocide. As a result, an estimated 800,000 to 1,500,000 Armenians were killed. |edition=1st }}Totten, Samuel, Paul Robert Bartrop, Steven L. Jacobs (eds.) Dictionary of Genocide. Greenwood Publishing Group, 2008, p. 19. . The Turkish government has refused to acknowledge the events as genocide and states that Armenians were only relocated from the eastern war zone. Genocidal campaigns were also committed against the empire's other minority groups such as the Assyrians and Greeks. |access-date=9 February 2013|year=2005|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-927356-0|page=150}} Following the Armistice of Mudros on 30 October 1918, the victorious Allied Powers sought to partition the Ottoman state through the 1920 Treaty of Sèvres. Republic of Turkey , founder and first President of the Turkish Republic, visiting Istanbul University after its reorganisation in 1933 as a mixed-gender institution of higher education with multiple faculties.]] The occupation of Istanbul (1918) and Izmir (1919) by the Allies in the aftermath of World War I prompted the establishment of the Turkish National Movement. Under the leadership of Mustafa Kemal Pasha, a military commander who had distinguished himself during the Battle of Gallipoli, the Turkish War of Independence (1919–1923) was waged with the aim of revoking the terms of the Treaty of Sèvres. By 18 September 1922 the Greek, Armenian and French armies were expelled, and the Ankara-based Turkish regime, which had declared itself the legitimate government of the country on 23 April 1920, started to formalise the legal transition from the old Ottoman into the new Republican political system. On 1 November 1922, the Turkish Parliament in Ankara formally abolished the Sultanate, thus ending 623 years of monarchical Ottoman rule. The Treaty of Lausanne of 24 July 1923 led to the international recognition of the sovereignty of the newly formed "Republic of Turkey" as the successor state of the Ottoman Empire, and the republic was officially proclaimed on 29 October 1923 in Ankara, the country's new capital. The Lausanne Convention stipulated a population exchange between Greece and Turkey, whereby 1.1 million Greeks left Turkey for Greece in exchange for 380,000 Muslims transferred from Greece to Turkey. |access-date=9 February 2013|year=2002|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-0-521-00479-4|page=101}} joined the Turkish Parliament with the 1935 general elections. Turkish women gained the right to vote a decade or more before women in Western European countries like France, Italy, and Belgium, a mark of the far-reaching social changes initiated by Atatürk. ]] Mustafa Kemal became the republic's first President and subsequently introduced Atatürk's Reforms. The reforms aimed to transform the old religion-based and multi-communal Ottoman constitutional monarchy into an Turkish nation state that would be governed as a parliamentary republic) under a secular constitution. |access-date=14 August 2013|year=2012|publisher=Princeton University Press|isbn=978-1-4008-3855-4|page=49|quote=Following the revolution, Mustafa Kemal became an important figure in the military ranks of the Ottoman Committee of Union and Progress (CUP) as a protégé ... Although the sultanate had already been abolished in November 1922, the republic was founded in October 1923. ... ambitious reform programme aimed at the creation of a modern, secular state and the construction of a new identity for its citizens.}} With the Surname Law of 1934, the Turkish Parliament bestowed upon Mustafa Kemal the honorific surname "Atatürk" (Father Turk). İsmet İnönü became Turkey's second President following Atatürk's death on 10 November 1938. In 1939 Turkey annexed the Republic of Hatay. Turkey remained neutral during most of World War II, but entered the closing stages of the war on the side of the Allies on 23 February 1945. On 26 June 1945, Turkey became a charter member of the United Nations. In the following year, the single-party period in Turkey came to an end, with the first multiparty elections in 1946. In 1949 Turkey became a member of the Council of Europe. The Democratic Party established by Celâl Bayar won the 1950, 1954 and 1957 general elections and stayed in power for a decade, with Adnan Menderes as the Prime Minister and Bayar as the President. After participating with the United Nations forces in the Korean War, Turkey joined NATO in 1952, becoming a bulwark against Soviet expansion into the Mediterranean. Turkey subsequently became a founding member of the OECD in 1961, and an associate member of the EEC in 1963. The country's tumultuous transition to multiparty democracy was interrupted by military coups d'état in 1960 and 1980, as well as by military memorandums in 1971 and 1997. Between 1960 and the end of the 20th century, the prominent leaders in Turkish politics who achieved multiple election victories were Süleyman Demirel, Bülent Ecevit and Turgut Özal. Following a decade of Cypriot intercommunal violence and the coup in Cyprus on 15 July 1974 staged by the EOKA B paramilitary organisation, which overthrew President Makarios and installed the pro-Enosis (union with Greece) Nikos Sampson as dictator, Turkey invaded Cyprus on 20 July 1974 by unilaterally exercising Article IV in the Treaty of Guarantee (1960), but without restoring the status quo ante at the end of the military operation. |access-date=16 August 2011|year=2003|publisher=Nova Publishers|isbn=978-1-59033-847-6|page=119}} In 1983 the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, which is recognised only by Turkey, was established. The Annan Plan for reunifying the island was supported by the majority of Turkish Cypriots, but rejected by the majority of Greek Cypriots, in separate referendums in 2004. However, negotiations for solving the Cyprus dispute are still ongoing between Turkish Cypriot and Greek Cypriot political leaders. In 1978, the Kurdistan Workers' Party (designated a terrorist organisation by Turkey and its NATO allies) was founded, and since 1984 the PKK and other Kurdish groups are engaged in an armed conflict with Turkey. The Kurds demand to have greater political and cultural rights for Kurds inside the Republic of Turkey. More than 40,000 people have died as a result of the conflict.Timeline: Kurdish militant group PKK's three-decade war with Turkey, Reuters, 21 March 2013 Since the liberalisation of the Turkish economy in the 1980s, the country has enjoyed stronger economic growth and greater political stability. Turkey applied for full membership of the EEC in 1987, joined the EU Customs Union in 1995 and started accession negotiations with the European Union in 2005. In March 2019 the European Parliament, following a non-binding vote, called to suspend Turkey accession talks. In 2013, widespread protests erupted in many Turkish provinces, sparked by a plan to demolish Gezi Park but soon growing into general anti-government dissent. On 15 July 2016, an unsuccessful coup attempt tried to oust the government. As a reaction to the failed coup d'état, the government is currently carrying out mass purges. In October 2019, Turkey invaded the Kurdish-controlled regions of Syria. Administrative divisions Turkey has a unitary structure in terms of administration and this aspect is one of the most important factors shaping the Turkish public administration. When three powers (executive, legislative and judiciary) are taken into account as the main functions of the state, local administrations have little power. Turkey does not have a federal system, and the provinces are subordinate to the central government in Ankara. Local administrations were established to provide services in place and the government is represented by the province governors (vali) and town governors (kaymakam). Other senior public officials are also appointed by the central government instead of the mayors (belediye başkanı) or elected by constituents. Turkish municipalities have local legislative bodies (belediye meclisi) for decision-making on municipal issues. Within this unitary framework, Turkey is subdivided into 81 provinces (il or vilayet) for administrative purposes. Each province is divided into districts (ilçe), for a total of 923 districts. Turkey is also subdivided into 7 regions (bölge) and 21 subregions for geographic, demographic and economic purposes; this does not refer to an administrative division. The centralised structure of decision-making in Ankara is stated by some academics as an impediment to good local governance, and occasionally causes resentment in the municipalities of urban centres that are inhabited largely by ethnic minority groups, such as the Kurds. Steps towards decentralisation since 2004 have proven to be a highly controversial topic in Turkey. The efforts to decentralise the administrative structure are also driven by the European Charter of Local Self-Government and with Chapter 22 ("Regional Policy & Coordination of Structural Instruments") of the ''acquis'' of the European Union. A decentralisation program for Turkey has been a topic of discussion in the country's academics, politics and the broader public. Geography Turkey is a transcontinental Eurasian country. |access-date=9 August 2011|year= 2009|publisher=Springer|isbn=978-0-387-88198-0|page=417}} Asian Turkey, which includes 97 percent of the country, is separated from European Turkey by the Bosphorus, the Sea of Marmara, and the Dardanelles. European Turkey comprises 3 percent of the country's territory. The territory of Turkey is more than long and wide, with a roughly rectangular shape. It lies between latitudes 35° and 43° N, and longitudes 25° and 45° E. Turkey's land area, including lakes, occupies , of which are in Southwest Asia and in Europe. Turkey is the world's 37th-largest country in terms of area. The country is encircled by seas on three sides: the Aegean Sea to the west, the Black Sea to the north and the Mediterranean to the south. Turkey also contains the Sea of Marmara in the northwest. and the Armenian Church of Akhtamar. Van is the largest lake in the country and is located in eastern Anatolia. ]] The European section of Turkey, eastern Thrace ( ) is located at the easternmost edge the Balkan peninsula). It forms the border between Turkey and its neighbours Greece and Bulgaria. The Asian part of the country is comprised mostly by the peninsula of Anatolia, which consists of a high central plateau with narrow coastal plains, between the Köroğlu and Pontic mountain ranges to the north and the Taurus Mountains to the south. Eastern Turkey has a more mountainous landscape and is home to the sources of rivers such as the Euphrates, Tigris and Aras. The western portion of the Armenian highland is located in eastern Turkey; this region contains Mount Ararat, Turkey's highest point at , and Lake Van, the largest lake in the country. Southeastern Turkey is located within the northern plains of Upper Mesopotamia. Turkey is divided into seven geographical regions: Marmara, Aegean, Black Sea, Central Anatolia, Eastern Anatolia, Southeastern Anatolia and the Mediterranean. The uneven north Anatolian terrain running along the Black Sea resembles a long, narrow belt. This region comprises approximately one-sixth of Turkey's total land area. As a general trend, the inland Anatolian plateau becomes increasingly rugged as it progresses eastward. Turkey's varied landscapes are the product of complex earth movements that have shaped the region over thousands of years and still manifest themselves in fairly frequent earthquakes and occasional volcanic eruptions. The Bosphorus and the Dardanelles owe their existence to the fault lines running through Turkey that led to the creation of the Black Sea. The North Anatolian Fault Line runs across the north of the country from west to east, along which major earthquakes took place in history. The latest of those big earthquakes was the 1999 İzmit earthquake. Biodiversity in the Pontic Mountains, which form an ecoregion with diverse temperate rainforest types, flora and fauna in northern Anatolia.]] Turkey's extraordinary ecosystem and habitat diversity has produced considerable species diversity. Anatolia is the homeland of many plants that have been cultivated for food since the advent of agriculture, and the wild ancestors of many plants that now provide staples for humankind still grow in Turkey. The diversity of Turkey's fauna is even greater than that of its flora. The number of animal species in the whole of Europe is around 60,000, while in Turkey there are over 80,000 (over 100,000 counting the subspecies). The Northern Anatolian conifer and deciduous forests is an ecoregion which covers most of the Pontic Mountains in northern Turkey, while the Caucasus mixed forests extend across the eastern end of the range. The region is home to Eurasian wildlife such as the Eurasian sparrowhawk, golden eagle, eastern imperial eagle, lesser spotted eagle, Caucasian black grouse, red-fronted serin, and wallcreeper. The narrow coastal strip between the Pontic Mountains and the Black Sea is home to the Euxine-Colchic deciduous forests, which contain some of the world's few temperate rainforests. The Turkish pine is mostly found in Turkey and other east Mediterranean countries. Several wild species of tulip are native to Anatolia, and the flower was first introduced to Western Europe with species taken from the Ottoman Empire in the 16th century. E.S. Forster (trans. et ed.), The Turkish Letters of Ogier Ghiselin de Busbecq (Oxford, 1927). There are 40 national parks, 189 nature parks, 31 nature preserve areas, 80 wildlife protection areas and 109 nature monuments in Turkey such as Gallipoli Peninsula Historical National Park, Mount Nemrut National Park, Ancient Troya National Park, Ölüdeniz Nature Park and Polonezköy Nature Park. The Anatolian leopard is still found in very small numbers in the northeastern and southeastern regions of Turkey.Can, O.E. (2004). Status, conservation and management of large carnivores in Turkey. Convention on the Conservation of European Wildlife and Natural Habitats. Standing Committee, 24th meeting, 29 November-3 December 2004, Strasbourg. The Eurasian lynx and the European wildcat are other felid species which are currently found in the forests of Turkey. Threats to biodiversity The Caspian tiger, now extinct, lived in the easternmost regions of Turkey until the latter half of the 20th century.Üstay, A.H. (1990). Hunting in Turkey. BBA, Istanbul. In the 21st century threats to biodiversity include desertification due to climate change in Turkey. Domestic animals Renowned domestic animals from Ankara, the capital of Turkey, include the Angora cat, Angora rabbit and Angora goat: and from Van Province the Van cat. The national dog breeds are the Anatolian Shepherd, Kangal, Malaklı and Akbaş. Climate The coastal areas of Turkey bordering the Aegean and Mediterranean Seas have a temperate Mediterranean climate, with hot, dry summers and mild to cool, wet winters. The coastal areas bordering the Black Sea have a temperate oceanic climate with warm, wet summers and cool to cold, wet winters. The Turkish Black Sea coast receives the greatest amount of precipitation and is the only region of Turkey that receives high precipitation throughout the year. The eastern part of that coast averages annually which is the highest precipitation in the country. The coastal areas bordering the Sea of Marmara, which connects the Aegean Sea and the Black Sea, have a transitional climate between a temperate Mediterranean climate and a temperate oceanic climate with warm to hot, moderately dry summers and cool to cold, wet winters. Snow falls on the coastal areas of the Sea of Marmara and the Black Sea almost every winter, but usually melts in no more than a few days. However snow is rare in the coastal areas of the Aegean Sea and very rare in the coastal areas of the Mediterranean Sea. Mountains close to the coast prevent Mediterranean influences from extending inland, giving the central Anatolian plateau of the interior of Turkey a continental climate with sharply contrasting seasons. Winters on the eastern part of the plateau are especially severe. Temperatures of −30 to −40 °C (−22 to −40 °F) can occur in eastern Anatolia. Snow may remain at least 120 days of the year. In the west, winter temperatures average below . Summers are hot and dry, with temperatures often above in the day. Annual precipitation averages about , with actual amounts determined by elevation. The driest regions are the Konya Plain and the Malatya Plain, where annual rainfall is often less than . May is generally the wettest month, whereas July and August are the driest. Demographics |percentages = pagr |1927 |13554000 |1930 |14440000 |1940 |17728000 |1950 |20807000 |1960 |27506000 |1970 |35321000 |1980 |44439000 |1990 |55120000 |2000 |64252000 |2010 |73003000 |2017 |79815000 }} According to the Address-Based Population Recording System of Turkey, the country's population was 74.7 million people in 2011, nearly three-quarters of whom lived in towns and cities. According to the 2011 estimate, the population is increasing by 1.35 percent each year. Turkey has an average population density of 97 people per km². People within the 15–64 age group constitute 67.4 percent of the total population; the 0–14 age group corresponds to 25.3 percent; while senior citizens aged 65 years or older make up 7.3 percent. In 1927, when the first official census was recorded in the Republic of Turkey, the population was 13.6 million. The largest city in Turkey, Istanbul, is also the largest city in Europe in population, and the third-largest city in Europe in terms of size. Article 66 of the Turkish Constitution defines a "Turk" as "anyone who is bound to the Turkish state through the bond of citizenship"; therefore, the legal use of the term "Turkish" as a citizen of Turkey is different from the ethnic definition. However, the majority of the Turkish population are of Turkish ethnicity and approximately 70–80 per cent of the country's citizens identify themselves as Turkish. It is estimated that there are at least 47 ethnic groups represented in Turkey. Reliable data on the ethnic mix of the population is not available, because Turkish census figures do not include statistics on ethnicity. }} Kurds are the largest non-Turkic ethnicity at anywhere from 12-25 per cent of the population. The exact figure remains a subject of dispute; according to Servet Mutlu, "more often then not, these estimates reflect pro-Kurdish or pro-Turkish sympathies and attitudes rather than scientific facts or erudition". Mutlu's 1990 study estimated Kurds made up around 12 per cent of the population, while Mehrdad Izady placed the figure around 25 per cent. The three "Non-Muslim" minority groups recognised in the Treaty of Lausanne were Armenians, Greeks and Jews. Other ethnic groups include Albanians, Arabs, Assyrians, Bosniaks, Circassians, Georgians and Lazs, Kurds, Pomaks (Bulgarians), Roma. The Kurds are concentrated in the east and southeast of the country, in what is also known as Turkish Kurdistan, making up a majority in the provinces of Tunceli, Bingöl, Muş, Ağrı, Iğdır, Elâzığ, Diyarbakır, Batman, Şırnak, Bitlis, Van, Mardin, Siirt and Hakkari, a near majority in Şanlıurfa Province (47%), and a large minority in Kars Province (20%). In addition, due to internal migration, Kurdish communities exist in all major cities in central and western Turkey, particularly in Istanbul, where there are an estimated 3 million Kurds, making Istanbul the city with the largest Kurdish population in the world. The minorities besides the Kurds are said to make up an estimated 7–12 percent of the population. Minority groups other than the three religious minorities recognised in the Treaty of Lausanne (Armenians, Greeks and Jews) do not have any official rights, and the use of minority languages is restricted. The term "minority" itself remains a sensitive issue in Turkey, while the Turkish government is frequently criticised for its treatment of minorities. Although minorities are not recognised, state-run Turkish Radio and Television Corporation (TRT) broadcasts television and radio programs in minority languages.Minority Rights and Cultural Rights gov.tr (accessed 7 January 2015).Turkey passes law to allow minority languages on TV ekurd.net Also, some minority language classes can be chosen in elementary schools. Immigration Immigration to Turkey is the process by which people migrate to Turkey to reside in the country. Turkey's migrant crisis created after an estimated 2.5 percent of the population are international migrants. Turkey hosts the largest number of refugees in the world, including Refugees of the Syrian Civil War in Turkey who are more than 2.8 million Syrian refugees, as of January 2017. Languages The official language is Turkish, which is the most widely spoken Turkic language in the world. It is spoken by 85.54 percent of the population as first language. 11.97 percent of the population speaks the Kurmanji dialect of Kurdish as mother tongue. Arabic and Zaza are the mother tongues of 2.39 percent of the population, and several other languages are the mother tongues of smaller parts of the population. Endangered languages in Turkey include Abaza, Abkhaz, Adyghe, Cappadocian Greek, Gagauz, Hértevin, Homshetsma, Kabard-Cherkes, Ladino (Judesmo), Laz, Mlahso, Pontic Greek, Romani, Suret, Turoyo, Ubykh, and Western Armenian. Religion Turkey is a secular state with no official state religion; the Turkish Constitution provides for freedom of religion and conscience. According to Ipsos, which interviewed 17,180 adults across 22 countries, in 2016 those who were interviewed from Turkey stated that Islam formed the overall major religion in Turkey, adhered to by 82% of the total population, followed by religiously unaffiliated people who comprised 13% of the population, and Christians with 2%. The role of religion in public life has been a controversial debate over the years since the formation of Islamist parties. |access-date=5 June 2013|year=2004|publisher=Rodopi|isbn=978-90-420-1665-1|pages=175–184}} For many decades, the wearing of the hijab was banned in schools and government buildings because it was viewed as a symbol of political Islam. However, the ban was lifted from universities in 2011, from government buildings in 2013, from schools in 2014, and from the Armed Forces in 2017. The government of Tayyip Erdoğan and his Justice and Development Party (AKP) pursue the explicit policy agenda of Islamization of education to "raise a devout generation" against secular resistance, in the process causing lost jobs and school for non-religious citizens of Turkey. However, some reporters say that Erdogan's policies have caused an increase in interest and support of secularism in Turkey. Islam in Istanbul is popularly known as the Blue Mosque due to the blue İznik tiles which adorn its interior. ]] After the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire the number of Muslims in the region that became Turkey increased relative to the Christian population as Ottoman Muslims, who were facing extermination or other forms of repression in the newly constituted Balkan states, emigrated to the country. Not all were ethnic Turks; some were Muslim Albanians, Bosniaks, Greek Muslims, Muslim Serbs, Macedonian Muslims and Bulgarian Muslims. Other Turks and Circassians fleeing Russian expansion in areas like the Caucasus and the Crimea also arrived during this period. By the 1920s, Islam had become the majority religion. There are no official statistics of people's religious beliefs nor is it asked in the census. According to the CIA 99.8% of the Turkish population is Muslim; other sources have given estimates ranging from as much as 96.4 percent to as low as 82 percent. The most popular sect is the Hanafi school of Sunni Islam. There are also some Sufi Muslims. Non-denominational Muslims have been estimated to range from 2 percent to 14 percent of the population. The highest Islamic religious authority is the Presidency of Religious Affairs ( ); it interprets the Hanafi school of law, and is responsible for regulating the operation of the country's 80,000 registered mosques and employing local and provincial imams. Some have also complained that under the Islamist government of the Justice and Development Party (AKP) and Tayyip Erdoğan, the old role of the Diyanet – maintaining control over the religious sphere of Islam in Turkey – has "largely been turned on its head". Now greatly increased in size, the Diyanet promotes a certain type of conservative (Hanafi Sunni) Islam inside Turkey, issuing fetva which disapprove activities such as "feeding dogs at home, celebrating the western New Year, lotteries, and tattoos"; and projecting this "Turkish Islam" abroad. Academics suggest the Alevi population may be from 15 to 20 million, while the Alevi-Bektaşi Federation states that there are around 25 million and according to Aksiyon magazine, the number of Shiite Twelvers (excluding Alevis) is 3 million (4.2 percent). Under the government of the Justice and Development Party (AKP) and Tayyip Erdoğan, an increasing discrimination against and persecution of the Alevi minority has begun. Christianity in Fatih, Istanbul, is famous for being made of prefabricated cast iron elements in the neo-Gothic style.]] Christianity has a long history in present-day Turkey, which is the birthplace of numerous Christian Apostles and Saints, such as Paul of Tarsus, Timothy, Nicholas of Myra, Polycarp of Smyrna and many others. Saint Peter founded one of the first churches in Antioch (Antakya), the location of which is regarded by tradition as the spot where he first preached the Gospel, and where the followers of Jesus were called Christians for the first time in history. The house where Virgin Mary lived the final days of her life until her Assumption (according to Catholic doctrine) or Dormition (according to Orthodox belief),The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume XIV, Copyright 1912 by Robert Appleton Company, Online Edition Copyright 2003 by K. Knight http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/14774a.htmHome of the Assumption: Reconstructing Mary's Life in Ephesus by V. Antony John Alaharasan 2006 p. 38 and the tomb of John the Apostle who accompanied her during the voyage to Anatolia after the crucifixion of Jesus, are in Ephesus. The cave churches in Cappadocia were among the hiding places of early Christians during the Roman persecutions against them. The Eastern Orthodox Church has been headquartered in Constantinople (Istanbul) since the First Council of Constantinople in 381 AD. |year=2013|publisher=Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing|isbn=978-0-8028-6717-9|page=31|quote=Constantinople has been the seat of an archiepiscopal see since the fourth century; its ruling hierarch has had the title of"Ecumenical Patriarch" ...}} |year=2001|publisher=Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing|isbn=978-90-04-11695-5|page=40|quote=The Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople is the ranking church within the communion of ... Between the 4th and 15th centuries, the activities of the patriarchate took place within the context of an empire that not only was ...}} Two of the five major episcopal sees of the Pentarchy (Constantinople and Antioch) instituted by Justinian the Great in 531 ADThe Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, s.v. patriarch (ecclesiastical), also calls it "a title dating from the 6th century, for the bishops of the five great sees of Christendom". And Merriam-Webster's Encyclopedia of World Religions says: "Five patriarchates, collectively called the pentarchy, were the first to be recognized by the legislation of the emperor Justinian (reigned 527–565)". were located in present-day Turkey during the Byzantine period."Pentarchy". Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved 14 February 2010. "The proposed government of universal Christendom by five patriarchal sees under the auspices of a single universal empire. Formulated in the legislation of the emperor Justinian I (527–65), especially in his Novella 131, the theory received formal ecclesiastical sanction at the Council in Trullo (692), which ranked the five sees as Rome, Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem". The percentage of Christians in Turkey fell from 17.5%, 3 million, (19% non-Muslim) in a population of 16 million to 2.5% percent in 1927, due to events which had a significant impact on the country's demographic structure, such as the Armenian Genocide, the population exchange between Greece and Turkey, and the emigration of Christians that began in the late 19th century and gained pace in the first quarter of the 20th century. The Wealth Tax on non-Muslims in 1942, the emigration of a portion of Turkish Jews to Israel after 1948, and the ongoing Cyprus dispute which damaged the relations between Turks and Greeks (culminating in the Istanbul pogrom of 6–7 September 1955) were other important events that contributed to the decline of Turkey's non-Muslim population. Today there are more than 120,000 people of different Christian denominations, representing less than 0.2 percent of Turkey's population, including an estimated 80,000 Oriental Orthodox, 35,000 Roman Catholics, 18,000 Antiochian Greeks, 5,000 Greek Orthodox, and smaller numbers of Protestants. Currently there are 236 churches open for worship in Turkey. Judaism in Edirne.]] The history of Judaism in Turkey goes back to the Romaniote Jews of Anatolia who have been present since at least the 5th century BC. They built ancient places of worship such as the Sardis Synagogue in Lydia and the Priene Synagogue in Ionia. The Sephardi Jews who were expelled from the Iberian peninsula and southern Italy under the control of the Spanish Empire were welcomed into the Ottoman Empire between the late-15th and mid-16th centuries. Despite emigration during the 20th century, modern-day Turkey continues to have a small Jewish population. At present, there are around 26,000 Jews in Turkey, the vast majority of whom are Sephardi. Agnosticism and atheism According to a 2010 Eurobarometer poll 94% of Turks who participated believed in God while only 1% did not. However, according to another poll conducted by KONDA the percentage of those who participated in the poll 2.9% said they were atheists. Atheism Association of Turkey, the first official atheist organisation in Balkans, Caucasus and Middle East, was founded in 2014. Education was founded in 1453 as a Darülfünûn. On 1 August 1933 it was reorganised and became the Republic's first university. ]] The Ministry of National Education is responsible for pre-tertiary education. This is compulsory and lasts twelve years: four years each of primary school, middle school and high school. Less than half of 25- to 34-year-old Turks have completed at least high school, compared with an OECD average of over 80 percent. Basic education in Turkey is said to lag behind other OECD countries, with significant differences between high and low performers. Turkey is ranked 32nd out of 34 in the OECD's PISA study. Access to high-quality school heavily depends on the performance in the secondary school entrance exams, to the point that some students begin taking private tutoring classes when they are ten years old. The overall adult literacy rate in 2011 was 94.1 percent; 97.9 percent for males and 90.3 percent for females. As of 2017, there are 190 universities in Turkey. Entry to higher education depends on the Student Selection and Placement System (ÖSYS). In 2008, the quota of admitted students was 600,000, compared to 1,700,000 who took the higher education exam in 2007. |access-date=12 June 2013|year=2009|publisher=Oxford Business Group|isbn=978-1-902339-13-9|page=203}} Except for the Open Education Faculties (AÖF) at Anadolu, Istanbul and Atatürk University; entrance is regulated by the national ÖSYS examination, after which high school graduates are assigned to universities according to their performance. According to the 2012–2013 Times Higher Education World University Rankings, the top university in Turkey is Middle East Technical University (in the 201–225 rank range), followed by Bilkent University and Koç University (both in the 226–250 range), Istanbul Technical University and Boğaziçi University (in the 276–300 bracket). All state and private universities are under the control of the Higher Education Board (YÖK), whose head is appointed by the President of Turkey; executive order 676 of October 2016 has created a system where in addition the President directly appoints all rectors of all state and private universities. Turkey is a member of the European Higher Education Area and actively participates in the Bologna Process. In 2016 the Skills Matter survey conducted by OECD found the levels of numeracy and literacy in the adult population of Turkey at rank 30 of the 33 OECD countries surveyed. In 2017 the theory of evolution was removed from the national curriculum in favour of teaching on the concept of jihad. Healthcare .]] Health care in Turkey used to be dominated by a centralised state system run by the Ministry of Health. In 2003, the government introduced a sweeping health reform programme aimed at increasing the ratio of private to state health provision and making healthcare available to a larger share of the population. Turkish Statistical Institute announced that 76.3 billion TL was spent for healthcare in 2012; 79.6 percent of which was covered by the Social Security Institution and 15.4 percent of which was paid directly by the patients. In 2012, there were 29,960 medical institutions in Turkey, and on average one doctor per 583 people and 2.65 beds per 1000 people. In 2015, life expectancy was 72.6 years for men and 78.9 for women, with an overall average of 75.8. See also * Index of Turkey-related articles * Outline of Turkey Notes References Further reading * * * Reed, Fred A. (1999). Anatolia Junction: a Journey into Hidden Turkey. Burnaby, BC: Talonbooks sic. 320 p., ill. with b&w photos. * * Roxburgh, David J. (ed.) (2005). Turks: A Journey of a Thousand Years, 600–1600. Royal Academy of Arts. . * Turkey: A Country Study (1996). Federal Research Division, Library of Congress. . * External links ;General * turkey.com – Topical multilingual website about Turkey. * * Turkey profile from the BBC News * Turkey at Encyclopædia Britannica * Turkey from UCB Libraries GovPubs * Data on Turkey from OECD * Better Life Index of Turkey from OECD * * Key Development Forecasts for Turkey from International Futures * ;Tourism * * Turkey Home – Turkey's Official Tourism Portal * Official website of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism * Turkey profile from UNESCO * Turkey profile from Lonely Planet ;Government * Official website of the Presidency of the Republic of Turkey * Official website of the Grand National Assembly of Turkey ;Economy * Official website of Ministry of the Ministry of Economy * Economic Survey of Turkey 2016 from OECD * Macroeconomic Data for Turkey Online Category:Turkey Category:Balkan countries Category:Southeastern European countries Category:Southern European countries Category:Eastern Mediterranean Category:E7 nations Category:G20 nations Category:Member states of NATO Category:Member states of the Council of Europe Category:Member states of the Union for the Mediterranean Category:Member states of the United Nations Category:Middle Eastern countries Category:Modern Turkic states Category:Near Eastern countries Category:Republics Category:States and territories established in 1923 Category:Western Asian countries Category:1923 establishments in Turkey Category:1923 establishments in Europe Category:1923 establishments in Asia Category:Countries in Europe Category:Countries in Asia Category:Turkish-speaking countries and territories